Born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, A Silver Mt. Zion (just one of its many names) came to life in 1999 as a project for Godspeed You! Black Emperor member Efrim Menuck in his attempt to learn to score music. The original idea was pushed aside, and the project would go on to become a group setting, and was more in touch with the idea of the organic growth and exploration of music than the heavily composed and arranged theoretical work of Godspeed. Inspired to record an album of the music that had been made, Menuck built up the first version of A Silver Mt. Zion, taking on violinist Sophie Trudeau and bassist Thierry Amar, both known as collaborators in the Godspeed family. The band made its live debut in 1999 and released its first album, He Has Left Us Alone But Shafts of Light Sometimes Grace the Corner of Our Rooms…, on Constellation in 2000. Still known as A Silver Mt. Zion, the band expanded its membership in 2000 – adding cellist Beckie Foon, guitarist Ian Ilavsky, and violinist Jessica Moss – which led to the first of many name changes.

With tune titles like "Glasgow Mega-Snake," "Acid Food," and "I Chose Horses," it should be clear Mogwai hasn’t taken any easy, mellowing departures on Mr. Beast. Sure, the album opens with the calming guitar atmospherics of "Auto Rock," but then "Glasgow Mega-Snake" comes bounding out with a crushing jog of a beat and a trademark granite slab of guitars. The Scots also indulge incrementally more beautiful and terrifying dreamscapes, especially the down-turned piano topping that hovers above a guitar storm on "Emergency Trap" and the layers of clear-toned melody that chime over a swirl of choked, feedback-drenched power on "Folk Death 95." There has long been talk of Scottish miserablism, and this colors and grinds the idea blissfully.

Snowdrift are a beautifully crafted slo-core quartet from Seattle, Washington consisting of Kat, Justin, Derek and Alan. Their self titled Paradigms Recordings debut from 2007 is beautifully understated, aglow with melancholic songwriting, the haunting atmospheres of Low, the dream-like fog of Mazzy Star and the intimate chamber resonance of maybe Amber Asylum or Neurot Recordings artists Bee & Flower. A wonderfully personal and introspective voyage into candlelit, nocturnal listening.

Battles' John Stanier, Ian Williams, and Dave Konopka always sound psyched to play together, but never more so than on their first entirely instrumental album, La Di Da Di. While vocals – first provided by Tyondai Braxton on their early work and by a host of collaborators on 2011's Gloss Drop – might have seemed necessary to humanize their experimentation, they're not missed on the band's third full-length. If anything, removing them gives the trio's ideas to generate sparks the way they did on Mirrored (particularly on "Tricentennial," which recalls the mischievous alien anthems of their debut) while keeping Gloss Drop's immediacy. Battles' mix of muscular drums and riffs and heady melodies and electronics has never sounded so liberated, whether on "The Yabba," a thrilling seven-minute excursion that sounds more like seven one-minute songs strung together, or on the relatively serene "Luu Le," which uses the same amount of time to close the album with a sun-dappled suite. Here and throughout La Di Da Di, the band sounds mercurial but not chaotic, with an interplay that ebbs and flows like creativity itself.

Seven CD box set with a full illustrated discography by renowned Fall expert Conway Paton. The discs have been remastered by Fall engineer Andy Pearce and come with a newly designed book in a box. The Fall is an English post-punk band, formed in Manchester in 1976…

Though Robin Trower found his greatest career success in the mid-'70s, his intensely soulful brand of Jimi Hendrix-inspired psychedelic blues-rock guitar playing helped him maintain a healthy audience decades past his commercial heyday…

Like Ten Rapid but with a more awkward name, Mogwai [EP+6] collects some of the experimental rock titans' singles and EPs with such a natural feel that it almost seems like it was designed as an album. In this case, 1997's 4 Satin EP is joined with 1999's self-titled EP and "Xmas Steps," the single version of Come on Die Young's track. The 13-and-a-half-minute "Stereodee" is just as compelling an epic as any of the tracks that wound up on either of those albums, showcasing the band's masterful way with ebbing, flowing, letting a song explode, and pulling it back together again. "Xmas Steps" – which is a minute longer than the album version of the song – also shows how expertly Mogwai can play with time and dynamics as they scale a mountain of sound that turns out to be a volcano when they get to the top.

Lava (established 1977 in Årdal, Norway) is a Norwegian jazz-rock band, known from a series of recordings in the 1980s (Polydor Records). The initiators Per Hillestad (drums), Svein Dag Hauge (guitar) were joined by Kjell Hestetun (bass) and Stein Eriksen (keyboards) and released the jazz funk influenced album Lava (1980), with contributions from Geir Langslet (keyboards) and Olav Stedje (vocals). When Hestetun and Eriksen left the band, the quartet Hauge, Hillestad and Langslet and bassist Rolf Graf continued releasing the album Cruisin (1981), with contributions by Per Kolstad (piano), Sigurd Køhn (saxophone) and Marius Müller (guitar), and the track «Take Your Time» became Norway and Europe hit.

Mark E Smith and The Fall are currently having their back catalogue reassessed by Cherry Red Records. The latest in what looks like a long line of forthcoming releases is ‘1982’. Featuring 2 acclaimed albums, a clutch of session tracks and 2 live albums plus a fresh 4,000 word essay by Daryl Easlea, this collection is a majestically compiled dive into the vaults of this much lauded band…

Fond of Tigers is a Canadian seven-piece post-rock instrumental band from Vancouver. An article in Exclaim! describes the band's sound: "with cacophonous explosions of percussion and guitar underlying wild strains of trumpet and violin, only to drop out for unexpected, ambient glimmers of a once-roaring piece." The group began in 2000 as a solo project of guitarist Stephen Lyons. After Lyons' pop group Beauventure disbanded, Lyons performed solo, and soon began playing along with tape loops and recorded sounds. In 2003 the project expanded to become a full band. Band members include Stephen Lyons on guitar, JP Carter on trumpet, Morgan McDonald on piano, Jesse Zubot on violin, Shanto Bhattacharya on bass, and Skye Brooks and Dan Gaucher on drums.

Showaddywaddy had more UK hits in the 1970s than any other act…including Abba! From their winning appearance on an edition of ‘New Faces’, the ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ of the day, to become runners-up in the series’ ‘All Winners Final’, it took just a matter of months until the band released and secured their debut hit, ‘Hey Rock And Roll’, which reached #2 in the UK Singles Chart…